Quick Links

Club PA 2.0 has arrived! If you'd like to access some extra PA content and help support the forums, check it out at patreon.com/ClubPA

The image size limit has been raised to 1mb! Anything larger than that should be linked to. This is a HARD limit, please do not abuse it.

Our new Indie Games subforum is now open for business in G&T. Go and check it out, you might land a code for a free game. If you're developing an indie game and want to post about it, follow these directions. If you don't, he'll break your legs! Hahaha! Seriously though.

Our rules have been updated and given their own forum. Go and look at them! They are nice, and there may be new ones that you didn't know about! Hooray for rules! Hooray for The System! Hooray for Conforming!

After the Death of Optimus Prime (IDW #125, WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 21st 2011), the "War for Cybertron" is officially over. The Autobots have won and took control of the planet. They are starting to rebuild. There is a choice though - stay or go. This is where the split into 2 books will happen. More Than Meets The Eye will follow Rodimus and his team, as they choose to leave Cybertron. Robots In Disguise will focus on the new leader, Bumblebee, and how he leads the remaining Autobots (and Decepticons, all Transformers for that matter), on Cybertron. Two books, one universe.

In More Than Meets The Eye, Rodimus will lead at least the following bots - Ultra Magnus, Drift, Ratchet (they are seen on the multi cover images). We will follow them and whomever goes with them in space as they search for the "Knights of Cybertron" a legendary band of bots. They are not even sure if they are real. They supposedly have the power to return Cybertron to the "Golden Age" before the war. This group will run into remnants of the Great War on planets and locations that aren't yet aware it is over, as well as other conflicts. So even though the war is over, it is still an action book.

Robots In Disguise will focus on Bumblebee and his attempts to rebuild Cybertron's society. Bots staying with 'Bee will include at least Ironhide, Prowl and Wheeljack. Thousands of neutral Transformers are returning home knowing the war is over. Cybertronians that fled the planet eons ago without choosing sides. Left over Decepticons are also present and need to be dealt with, re-integrated. Bumblebee doesn't want to return to the past; rather, he wants to forge a new future for their race. Here and now, moving forward. Managing all these factions and points of view is hard and we will follow his journey through that.

So basically - it is a philosophical difference between groups of Autobots after the war. Do they look to the past and try to rediscover it, or move away from it look to the future? We follow each view point in the 2 books.

At first, there will be some crossover in the books. But after the "split" officially happens, the books will be relatively independent of each other. There will be themes that may crossover, and Rodimus' crew members may "call home" every so often. But otherwise, independent.

The way this is being pushed is that if you are new to the IDW universe, new to Transformers, or just want to jump back in, this is a good point to do so. It's a reboot without losing the rich continuity they have built over the last 3 years.

The creative teams for these ongoings are the greatest writers and greatest artists that IDW has ever had for the universe. Roche and Roberts did the critically acclaimed, sold-out Last Stand of the Wreckers, while Griffith illustrated one of John Barber's comics that took place in the Transformers movie continuity. Barber's a former Wolverine editor that combined two previous Transformers movie comic adaptations, five books, at least seven other comic miniseries, and toy bios from a conflicting morass into an amazing read.
The release schedule was planned to be MTMTE on the first week of the month, and RID on the third, but it isn't set in stone. You don't need to have read a single comic in the universe from before now to get into it, but it will let you appreciate nods to the past. They plan on using previously underutilized characters along with the main cast. The potential exists for mini-series to spin out from the ongoings, but it's not a guaranteed thing. The writers come up with ideas, and barring one or two exceptions, they aren't censored or reeled back in anyway. They aren't selling toys, they are creating a story. This means they can kill who they want, and introduce who they want. Also, no humans, from what I can tell.

The Death of Optimus Prime and More Than Meets the Eye #1 are illustrated by Roche, but due to other work, Alex Milne will illustrate the series from #2 on.

Hound is very likely going to be in Robots In Disguise! He's on Cybertron right now, hasn't been killed in Chaos as far as I know, and Cybertron's going to be inhabited by everyone that hasn't died or isn't going exploring with Rodimus's crew.

Drift being in MTMTE may make me pick up the title. I have no affection for the character, but that fact that he's there may mean that there will be less of the over-referencing and sometimes even smugness that I've disliked about Robert's previous Transformers works.

I REALLY haven't noticed smugness in his work. I will grant that he draws on a hell of a lot of references, but he's really into the history of the franchise, and it's nice for people of various levels of knowledge to read a story and go "hey! I get that."

dude really loves giant robots, and it's exciting to see that someone cares that much.

more news about the status quo re: Earth from Transformers #29
Spoiler tagged in case anyone cares about specifics

Spike Witwicky made a deal with Swindle to get technology for Skywatch, the Army's anti-Transformer branch

Swindle teamed up with a human to inspire fear and distribute the weaponry that brainwashed humans and was effective against Cybertronians

Witwicky is now a fugitive because he went behind his superiors' backs and killed a Decepticon that surrendered

Jazz publicly airs a broadcast between himself and a Skywatch official that the Autobot/Human Government alliance is over, they aren't going to collaborate anymore

he then wipes all of Skywatch's Cybertronian weapon data, burns a decommissioned base to the ground, and the Autobots on Earth leave for Cybertron

Prowl sees what Witwicky has done as what Prowl used to do: acting as though the ends justify the means. Prowl would have done anything to keep the Autobot cause alive, manipulating others and using Kup as a figurehead that he could control. This issue also shows that Prowl did NOT destroy the Aequitas chip from the end of Last Stand of the Wreckers, the chip that had evidence from Autobot war crime trials. He was initially worried that the records could split the Autobots apart if they knew what monsters lurked in their ranks, but he evidently thought better of obstructing justice.

That's.......interesting. I'd kind of hope to get some kind of reasoning on that in the first issue of More Than Meets the Eye.

I do like what was written about Robots in Disguise, about how Bumblebee is just trying to be nice to everyone and has to deal with trying to unite those who really don't care about what he's trying to do.

I'm really liking the interior art for Death of Optimus Prime. I mean, I know I'm biased, but I love Nick's lines and Burcham's colors, and those designs of the neutral Cybertronians look really fucking cool. Definitely not the standard looking G1 style robot, or a movie style alien walking chandelier.
I am curious about Hound being with Rodimus, but Roberts did say that each of the members of his team each has a different understanding of why they're there.
Plus, woo, Gears is on the team and they're supposed to be the robo-Avengers!

Also, poor Rodimus's gotten bad redesigns ever since All Hail Megatron. His look in Furman's run was tits.

How would you pitch this series to someone who grew up with "Transformers" or watched the recent movies but has not been reading the IDW comics?

Roberts: In a single sentence: the new series are going to be bold and thrilling and funny and dark, the way the best comics should be.

"Transformers" has been around for over a quarter of a century, and in that time, there have been so many comics, cartoons, toy ranges and movies that it can be hard to keep track of what's what. For people on the outside looking in -- and I'm talking about people who saw the show as a kid, or had a few of the toys, or who saw the live action films and want to find out more -- it can be difficult to know where to start, certainly as far as the comics are concerned.

As much as I love the "Transformers" comics universe that IDW has been publishing, it can be difficult for someone to just dip into -- there's a feeling that you need to know your continuity to fully appreciate what's going on. Also, the sheer number of G1 characters, and the scale of the story -- this is an intergalactic war that raged for four million years -- can make it difficult for casual fans, or the simply curious, to find their bearings. With "Chaos" and "The Death of Optimus Prime," the TF comics universe is tidied up, ready for the next phase. I mean, yes, there are still threads left hanging, and not every question from the last six years has been answered, but there's a sense that everything is in its place, and the mechanics of the G1 universe are easily grasped: at the start of "MTMTE," which is the first of the two ongoing series to launch, everyone that matters is on Cybertron, and the story flows organically from that point on.

While emphatically not a reboot, the new series do allow anyone with the remotest interest in massive alien robots to rediscover what they loved about "Transformers" in the first place.

That is not a pitch. I had to read the full article to get the gist of what is going on, and I still don't get it even though I probably should and there is an assumption that I should.

And as such, I don't particularly care. I remember reading or flipping through the beginning of Last Stand. Seemed neat, and then something happened and I stopped reading it. So I'm not averse to it, but I am not getting a really good idea other than comparing it to X-Men, which is another thing I don't care much about.

To explain Chaos and The Death of Optimus Prime, Chaos is a currently ongoing event. Judging from the various solicits and promotions, here are the apparent results of Chaos, all that you need to know:
The Transformers have left Earth, and have no reason to go back at the moment.
Galvatron, an entity separate from Megatron, led an army to conquer Cybertron, and failed.
Megatron and the Decepticons have lost the Civil War to the Autobots.
Cybertron, long lost to the Transformer race, is safe to live on after millions of years, but it isn't in the best shape.
The thousands, maybe millions of Cybertronians that didn't take sides in the Civil War and left Cybertron have come back.
Something occurs to get Optimus Prime to stand down as leader, if not truly die.

The number ones will take place after Optimus stops leading the Autobots. Two of his followers try to fill his shoes.
Roche and Roberts, the Last Stand creative team, are doing an action book called More Than Meets The Eye starring Rodimus and a team of followers travelling around the galaxy to try to restore Cybertron to its former glory by seeking a legendary group of heroes, the Knights of Cybertron. It should get into what Cybertronian culture used to be, and have multiple personalities bouncing off each other. But, as Roberts says in his unsuccessful pitch, all of the characters start out on Cybertron and then go exploring.

Meanwhile, Barber and Griffith are doing a book called Robots In Disguise that has Bumblebee trying to lead Cybertron and bring together Autobots, former Decepticons, and new arrivals to the planet who had left after the Cybertronian Civil War made it uninhabitable for millions of years. Bumblebee is trying to create a new future and do the right thing. Starscream, Megatron's ex-lieutenant is in this book, likely going to cause havoc. Cyclonus, Galvatron's ex-lieutenant, is going to be in the book too, but like Starscream's role, it's unknown what he's going to do for sure. Bumblebee will have to try to get multiple factions and viewpoints together and not kill each other, hopefully creating a new future.

So, that's the ideological struggle, try to bring Cybertron back to exactly how it was, or try something not tried before.

So I got to ask what happened to Rodimus, I take it was the Matrix he got blown out into space that fixed him up?

Who has it now.

And what's Megs doing, I heard he got armored up some.

Rodimus gave the Matrix back to Optimus Prime, he felt the leader of the Autobots deserved it most. But, it's been hinted that Rodimus deserves the Matrix more than Optimus. Meanwhile, yeah, Megatron is in a huge, armored, extremely powerful form. He's fighting against Galvatron's troops singlehandedly right now. No idea what happens to Megatron following the Chaos event.

So the shorter pitch is: Left Earth. Decepticons Lost. Civilian Diaspora and Autobots/Decepticons al return to Cybertron. A/Ds split among themselves on how to rebuild. Disaspora pretty much hates all of them anyway. Prime is dead. Bumblebee and Rodimus lead the two factions.

Sounds intriguing.

Their elevator pitch should be something like, "Autobots won the war, and now Bumblebee and Rodimus are divided on how to lead all the Autobots, Decepticons, and returned Diaspora to rebuild Cybertron. Oh, Optimus is dead."

The idea is to sell it in one sentence. After that it becomes magnitudes more difficult. The current motto for Shadowrun is, "Twenty years of shooting people in the face for money." If you don't like that, it becomes immeasurably more difficult to sell the product.

It's such a strange reversal. Before Chaos Costa's best work was with the space stuff, and then it switched completely when space became the main focus. Maybe he's just better at character driven sidestories (actually, scratch that, after comparing Cobra with Blackhawks, I KNOW he's just better at character driven sidestories).

I will say this: taking them away from earth forever does take away the whole "robots who turn into cool, recognizable things" aspect. We'll see though, I'll give each a shot.

Another minor complaint: Having both titles names after successive lines in a theme song means I get them confused all the time.

So, on the advice of Anti, I purchased and read Last Stand of the Wreckers.

It was pretty good.

It has a pretty simple, and compelling story; a giant Autobot-run prison has been captured by a rogue Decepticon, and a special team of Autobots must infiltrate the prison, free their captured comrades, and mount an escape. It's kind of like The Great Escape, but with more robots.

There are twists, and turns, with dark secrets revealed, and characters behaving in ways that are compelling, and believable. There's snappy dialogue, funny jokes, good art, a compelling antagonist, and an ending that almost makes you feel sorry for the bad guy.

I can totally get behind all that.

Where it broke down for me, was in the minutiae, and little tangents the story would take, with minor characters. There's one character who, over the course of the five issues, makes three appearances; once when he's defending the prison from assault, once when he's in a gladiatorial death match, and once when his mangled body is later found by a group of characters. All to set up a reveal about the lead antagonist, that's ultimately pretty minor. Another minor character, a Decepticon, has a decent amount of page time devoted to his character arc, which ultimately winds up petering out, resolving in anti-climax.

My other big issue with the book, was that it was way too hard to differentiate, and remember, who the huge cast of characters were. My only real exposure to Transformers, is through Beast Wars, and the animated movie that came out during the 80's. Which, I still love and watch quite often. That movie made it really easy to differentiate between everyone.

Kup; marine-blue guy, craggy and old.

Springer; green guy, confident and skilled.

Blur; blue guy, talks fast.

Hotrod; red guy, young and hotheaded.

Arcee; pink, level-headed lady-robot.

Dinobots; fucking dinosaur-robots.

In Last Stand of the Wreckers, I had a bit more of a hard time with it. Minor characters just kind of show up, drifting in and out of the story with little time to expound on who they are. And the character designs, which have slightly more jumbled color palettes than the cartoons, really didn't help me out, in differentiating between characters.

Just as an example, three Decepticons, Skyquake, Stalker, and Snare, are share a lot of design similarities. They all have orange mouth-plates, green eyes, and grey-black heads. When one of the characters is killed early on, and another shows up later, I had to flip back, and make sure I didn't miss something. When another character is introduced, I had to flip back again, and make sure this was a whole new guy.

There's also the two Autobots who are on the same team, Guzzle and Ironfist, both of whom share some design similarities, with short, rotund bodies, and big turret barrels jutting off their backs. Or Pyro, who straight up looks like a skinny Optimus Prime, which is pointed out by another character, which was pretty funny.

Interestingly, a group of characters referred to as Squadron X show up late in the book, and I was immediately struck by how diverse and memorable all their character designs were.

Like I said, I give it a solid rating of pretty good. I think I'd have liked it better if it was focused on a smaller group of characters, and there was more work put into giving them more memorable character designs. But, the very nature of the book, as kind of a self-contained Transformers Suicide Squad, dictates that there have to be a bunch of disposable also-ran Transformers. And since Transformers is an existing property, they also have to basically stick to the character designs already laid down.

I don't hold any of that against the creators, but it did ultimately impact my enjoyment of the book.

Oh, and Perceptor became a bad ass at some point between the 80's movie, and this comic. That was something of a surprise.

glad you liked it! yeah, the character designs that were samey, almost all based on european exclusive toys without much, if any prior fiction, pretty much. they were redesigned enough that they looked semi-modern and NOT like giant hunks of plastic without any movement. But yeah, Skyquake, Snare, Stalker, all designed around the same time as members of a team called the Predators when they were released. Sadly, the European toys from that time period were a tad derivative and generic, but that DID lead to the joke about Pyro, which itself was elaborated upon in the short story Bullets which was included in the trade.
the unique designs of Squadron X? They were all characters originally drawn as redshirt enemies for various issues of the Marvel comic, brought back just for fun.

your complaints are fair, and I'm glad that they didn't ruin the book for you! Bullets, the short story included in the back of the trade, makes Ironfist's story even more tragic and interesting, and gives better characterization to a lot of the main team of Wreckers.

glad you liked it! yeah, the character designs that were samey, almost all based on european exclusive toys without much, if any prior fiction, pretty much. they were redesigned enough that they looked semi-modern and NOT like giant hunks of plastic without any movement. But yeah, Skyquake, Snare, Stalker, all designed around the same time as members of a team called the Predators when they were released. Sadly, the European toys from that time period were a tad derivative and generic, but that DID lead to the joke about Pyro, which itself was elaborated upon in the short story Bullets which was included in the trade.
the unique designs of Squadron X? They were all characters originally drawn as redshirt enemies for various issues of the Marvel comic, brought back just for fun.

your complaints are fair, and I'm glad that they didn't ruin the book for you! Bullets, the short story included in the back of the trade, makes Ironfist's story even more tragic and interesting, and gives better characterization to a lot of the main team of Wreckers.

I unfortunately dont have the trade, but isn't the Pyro explanation

That theres a bunch of Autobots out there with Prime-like heads, that are birthed with some mental defect that makes them think they're Optimus?

glad you liked it! yeah, the character designs that were samey, almost all based on european exclusive toys without much, if any prior fiction, pretty much. they were redesigned enough that they looked semi-modern and NOT like giant hunks of plastic without any movement. But yeah, Skyquake, Snare, Stalker, all designed around the same time as members of a team called the Predators when they were released. Sadly, the European toys from that time period were a tad derivative and generic, but that DID lead to the joke about Pyro, which itself was elaborated upon in the short story Bullets which was included in the trade.
the unique designs of Squadron X? They were all characters originally drawn as redshirt enemies for various issues of the Marvel comic, brought back just for fun.

your complaints are fair, and I'm glad that they didn't ruin the book for you! Bullets, the short story included in the back of the trade, makes Ironfist's story even more tragic and interesting, and gives better characterization to a lot of the main team of Wreckers.

I unfortunately dont have the trade, but isn't the Pyro explanation

That theres a bunch of Autobots out there with Prime-like heads, that are birthed with some mental defect that makes them think they're Optimus?

even more interesting than that!

Due to trauma of some kind, they take on a severe hero worship of Optimus Prime, and start to alter their body to look like him. Pyro even expanded his chest cavity to fit the Matrix. The mental disorder is called Primus apotheosis, and it affects a small amount of Autobots and an even smaller amount of Decepticons.

I mean we see how people in our society worship movie stars or the famous. We got people who try to make themselves look like their heroes, you know like that Philippians man who is making himself look like Superman. So a race of robots that can change themselves up would or should not find it too difficult to make themselves look more like their heroes at all.

Hmmm, does this mean we'll see a new "Megatron militia" at some point.

Where it broke down for me, was in the minutiae, and little tangents the story would take, with minor characters. There's one character who, over the course of the five issues, makes three appearances; once when he's defending the prison from assault, once when he's in a gladiatorial death match, and once when his mangled body is later found by a group of characters. All to set up a reveal about the lead antagonist, that's ultimately pretty minor. Another minor character, a Decepticon, has a decent amount of page time devoted to his character arc, which ultimately winds up petering out, resolving in anti-climax.

Not trying to refute your points, but just some thoughts:

I think the Autobot you're referring to was meant to show just how twisted and sadistic the main villain was and to show what can happen to Autobots if they're pushed too far, which helps contribute to Impactor's arc.

As for the Decepticon, I think it was meant to show that not all 'cons are horrible monsters. I also think his purpose in the story was more to contribute to Impactor's story than to have a meaningful impact on his own.

glad you liked it! yeah, the character designs that were samey, almost all based on european exclusive toys without much, if any prior fiction, pretty much. they were redesigned enough that they looked semi-modern and NOT like giant hunks of plastic without any movement. But yeah, Skyquake, Snare, Stalker, all designed around the same time as members of a team called the Predators when they were released. Sadly, the European toys from that time period were a tad derivative and generic, but that DID lead to the joke about Pyro, which itself was elaborated upon in the short story Bullets which was included in the trade.
the unique designs of Squadron X? They were all characters originally drawn as redshirt enemies for various issues of the Marvel comic, brought back just for fun.

your complaints are fair, and I'm glad that they didn't ruin the book for you! Bullets, the short story included in the back of the trade, makes Ironfist's story even more tragic and interesting, and gives better characterization to a lot of the main team of Wreckers.

I unfortunately dont have the trade, but isn't the Pyro explanation

That theres a bunch of Autobots out there with Prime-like heads, that are birthed with some mental defect that makes them think they're Optimus?

even more interesting than that!

Due to trauma of some kind, they take on a severe hero worship of Optimus Prime, and start to alter their body to look like him. Pyro even expanded his chest cavity to fit the Matrix. The mental disorder is called Primus apotheosis, and it affects a small amount of Autobots and an even smaller amount of Decepticons.

In a perfect universe, Animated Lugnut would succumb to this. That's right, keep picturing it. Let it all sink in.

glad you liked it! yeah, the character designs that were samey, almost all based on european exclusive toys without much, if any prior fiction, pretty much. they were redesigned enough that they looked semi-modern and NOT like giant hunks of plastic without any movement. But yeah, Skyquake, Snare, Stalker, all designed around the same time as members of a team called the Predators when they were released. Sadly, the European toys from that time period were a tad derivative and generic, but that DID lead to the joke about Pyro, which itself was elaborated upon in the short story Bullets which was included in the trade.
the unique designs of Squadron X? They were all characters originally drawn as redshirt enemies for various issues of the Marvel comic, brought back just for fun.

your complaints are fair, and I'm glad that they didn't ruin the book for you! Bullets, the short story included in the back of the trade, makes Ironfist's story even more tragic and interesting, and gives better characterization to a lot of the main team of Wreckers.

I unfortunately dont have the trade, but isn't the Pyro explanation

That theres a bunch of Autobots out there with Prime-like heads, that are birthed with some mental defect that makes them think they're Optimus?

even more interesting than that!

Due to trauma of some kind, they take on a severe hero worship of Optimus Prime, and start to alter their body to look like him. Pyro even expanded his chest cavity to fit the Matrix. The mental disorder is called Primus apotheosis, and it affects a small amount of Autobots and an even smaller amount of Decepticons.

In a perfect universe, Animated Lugnut would succumb to this. That's right, keep picturing it. Let it all sink in.

oh my god

also

Mike Costa, the guy who previously wrote for the ongoing and is leaving now, has some choice remarks:

During his first year writing The Transformers, Mike says he got really burnt out, stating that writing for Transformers was "tough and not fun". He goes on to state: "The characters are so difficult to understand." He compares a human coming back after serving only 2 years in a war and their entire psyche is destroyed, their life changed. But these characters are robots that are millions of years old fighting a war that's a million years old. He goes on to state: "They don’t get hungry, they don’t get tired, they don’t have women, they don’t have relationships that they value, because they don’t have females that they can love, maybe brotherly love but how, they don’t have parents?”

- “All the basic things that motivate a person in any kind of adventure story that motivate them, these characters do not have them. You have to manufacture them. Why would a robot that’s millions of years old have a personality like a human? That’s insane.”

- “Transformers are toys. They are toys. That’s why they’re giant robots that turn in to cars. They’re toys. There’s no reason a robot would turn in to a car, they’re toys. I guess you could come up with reasons for it – a lot of writers have – it’s just so strange.”

- “Cars and trucks in a comic book aren’t expressive – there’s no character to a car.”

- “My job as a writer is to understand why characters are doing certain things – beyond why they are doing things in a certain moment – to who they are as people, but that’s where questions start getting really confusing, because these ‘things’ aren’t people.”

- “Transformers fans read Transformers comics, and only Transformers comics. They are isolated from the rest of the comic book world.”

- “Most Transformers fans don’t read comics.”

- In the comic book community, Transformers are not looked upon favorably. They are looked upon as being silly and “not-serious” comics. GI Joe is taken seriously. “GI Joe still has respectability, while Transformers does not.”

- Mike Costa blames the fall of popularity with Transformers comics not on himself or anyone with IDW Publishing, but with Dreamwave Comics, and the implosion that company had that effected the creators, the retailers, and of course, the fans. He goes on to state: “Some of those stories weren’t all that great.”

- “I don’t think these books will be number 1 again. They target their market, and their market is shrinking, and there’s a lot of people in that market that are unpleasant.”

- Mike Costa goes on to state that (a lot of) Transformers comic fans are very arrogant and hostile, painting a picture that they will continue to buy something simply to continue to hate it. He goes on to add that this happens with most properties, but Transformers fans are more vocal. He does add that it's this same attitude and desire to be heard that kept the franchise alive in the 90's all the way to the 2007 movie.

- He also states that from what he can see, there's very little agreement between comic fans on what they dislike about Transformers comics. A group of them may all dislike the comic, but none of them agree exactly on what they dislike about it.

- “The most harsh fans suffer from tunnel vision and lack perspective." At first this statement was applied only to Transformers comics, but he continues on and ends up referencing "in their world", or their life, so to speak.

- Mike briefly touches upon the cry from fans on message boards regarding "Why don't they listen to the fans!?". “There’s probably about a total of 100 active posters across ALL the Transformers message forums on the Internet.”

- Mike continues on... “Why aren’t we listening to the fans? It means we’re not listening to you and the other 20 people that post on message boards.”